UFC’s vice-president of regulatory affairs, Marc Ratner publically denied rumours that the UFC 115 event to be held June 12th in Vancouver, Canada is cancelled.

Ratner, speaking via The Canadian Press, said:

“We’re certainly working hand in hand with the mayor’s office and the city council, and hopefully we have what they want”

“The fight is still going forward as we speak.”

“The hold-up is (that) we need to be sure that nobody is going to sue the city,”

“I wanted to get everything done if we could before the Olympics, and that we couldn’t do,” he said. “We lost a couple of months, so I wasn’t surprised (we had problems).

“I thought we’d have it done by now, but I’m just enthusiastic, and I look at the positives.”

“We want to put a show on in Vancouver. We’re very, very strongly wanting to do it. If we had to … postpone the show, we’ll still be looking (at Vancouver) some other time.”

Vancouver city councillor, Dr. Kerry Jang, said:

“That’s why we were just dumbfounded when all this stuff started to come out in the media about it being cancelled and UFC was this (and that). It’s really not (the) UFC. We’ve been working with them closely for three months now to work out these issues.”

“Where these reports came from, I don’t know. Everybody’s suspecting maybe somebody was trying to wrap it up or trying to push the negotiations along. But we’re very clear, we won’t put the city of Vancouver at risk. The province has to come forward and help us out here. Otherwise, if we can’t reach an agreement, it goes to Cincinnati or wherever they want to go. They can come back when the law’s changed.”

“The sticking point, as I understand it from our staff, is we need assurances in writing that a claim would not be denied because of the old and antiquated Criminal Code provision. The question is now how do we get the insurance companies to provide us with that assurance and that’s where the negotiation is now.”

“Until we get that, we’re 100 percent responsible and can’t take those risks.”

“What needs to happen to make this work? The B.C. government needs to step up and show leadership on it. We’re making precedent here. We can’t be too cautious.”

About William Smith

After watching the first Ultimate Fighting Championship I became instantly hooked. I've been a huge fan of the sport of MMA ever since. Haven't missed a UFC event & thanks to fight pass I've witnessed some of the all time greatest fighter & athletes the sport through Pride, Strikeforce, WEC, Glory, Pacrase, EliteXC..............
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